A vehicle refers to an apparatus that transports people or freight from one place to another by driving wheels. For example, the vehicle may include a two-wheeled vehicle such as a motorcycle, a four-wheeled vehicle such as a sedan, and even a train.
To enhance user safety and convenience in using vehicles, development of technologies for connecting various sensors and electronic devices to the vehicle has been accelerated. In particular, a system that provides various functions (e.g., smart cruise control, lane keeping assistance) developed to provide driving convenience to users has been employed in the vehicle. This enables autonomous driving in which the vehicle can autonomously travel on a road in consideration of the external environment, without requiring the driver's intervention.
In addition, as a conventional technology related to vehicles, the concept of group travel has been proposed. The group travel means that a plurality of vehicles bundled in one group shares traveling information with each other and travels on a road while considering the external environment.
One group includes a leader vehicle and follower vehicles. The leader vehicle is a vehicle that leads the group at the head of the group, and follower vehicles are vehicles that follow the leader vehicle.
The follower vehicles of the group can keep following the leader vehicle, using the traveling information (e.g., GPS coordinates, speed, path, direction, and braking information) about the leader vehicle transmitted through inter-vehicle communication or the like. Accordingly, the drivers of the follower vehicles can freely perform other actions (e.g., operation of a smartphone, sleeping) than driving inside the vehicles. Such group travel may enhance convenience for the drivers and improve transport efficiency.
However, the group travel technologies that have been introduced have a limitation in that all the vehicles in a group should be aligned in a line. For example, even if there is an empty lane on the road, the follower vehicles in the group must follow the leader vehicle only with the same lane as the leader vehicle.
Further, when an alien vehicle cuts into the group, follower vehicles behind the alien vehicle cannot follow the leader vehicle properly.